You may recall a comment which accused me of lumping readers into black and white stereotypical categories and not giving them much credit in my post here: http://hopeofglory.typepad.com/into_the_fire/2011/04/when-story-trumps-writing-.html.
I make an effort to speak with all kinds of readers to ascertain what they want, expect, and look for in their choice of novels. Some expect very little besides entertainment. Others want a specific experience and dismiss novels which don’t meet their requirement. Some readers will finish a book no matter how much they detest it, and others will chuck a book if it fails them in any way after a chapter or two or twenty. Some readers place no limitations on genres. Others read within a tight framework of specific genres.
I thought I covered the variety of readers in these sentences:
“It’s important to remember that many parts of writing, stripped down from all the high-falutin’ critiques, opinions, praises, and assaults, are merely a matter of taste. Some highbrow and some lowbrow. Some with intelligent assessment and some with gut-feeling. Some with a teacher’s mentality and some with a student’s appreciation. As writers or readers, we do not walk the same literary paths, but we all have the option to travel our favorites.”
So let’s look at giving readers “credit”. I don’t know a single reader who’s ever had trouble with POV shifts, no matter how frequent or complex. Maybe minor annoyance, but nothing that warrants major concern. Many of the classics, written by the supposed best and brightest, include multiple “head-hopping” as the current literary talking heads choose to call this experience. It seems the powers that be and many of the writerly crowd of today’s literary consumption have decided that POV shifts within scenes are too complex for today’s readers to understand, follow, and/or keep up with, and therefore make for inferior writing and marked confusion among readers. Who’s not giving readers much credit now?
Ditto for passive verb usage, too many adverbs, adjectives, and metaphors spoiling the reading experience. For writers who’ve studied the current trends for “good” writing, they might agree. Many readers might also agree, but many readers will also not agree. It has nothing to do with knowledge or intelligence, but it has everything to do with taste or preference or indifference to technique.
This isn’t so much about my previous post—either defending it or emphasizing it. It’s about assuming things about readers which simply don’t matter to some of them. Devoted readers can surf through any literary waves, some precisely identifying why they like or dislike a novel and others simply content to enjoy a story or toss the book across the room when they don’t.
If publishing at large—for all of its great successes—could boast that more than 75% of their selected fare earn back the author advances instead of the widely accepted number that upwards of 60% do not, I might agree that the current trends in publishing and writing give unmistakable proof that they know what readers want, giving credit where credit is due.
Father, your “credit” is all that matters. Storing up treasure in heaven . . . help it to be my goal. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.